Teen-age Suspect Wrecks Car, Is Arrested In $2,500 Robbery

FORT LAUDERDALE -- A teen-age robbery suspect was arrested Friday after smashing a car that he commandeered at a gas station into a wall under the Southwest Seventh Avenue bridge, police said.

The juvenile, who told police he was 17, fled on foot into a residential area after the accident and hid under a boat cover until police with K-9 dogs flushed him out.

He was carrying $2,500 in cash from a stolen purse, police said.

``After he saw the dog coming, he went up to a resident and said, `Can you call me a cab?` and he held out the wad of cash,`` Officer Gerald Pfeiffer said.

The unidentified resident declined to help, and Officer Steven Littlefield, with his dog, Duke, arrested the suspect, Pfeiffer said.

The chase started about 2 p.m. after the teen-ager and another suspect grabbed a purse from Harriette Glassman, 52, of Fair Lawn, N.J., behind the Eurospec car dealership in the 1000 block of East Sunrise Boulevard, police said.

The woman, who was sitting in a parked Jaguar with her window rolled down, suffered bruises as she tried to resist. Another woman in the car managed to hang onto her own purse, even though she was punched in the face by one of the suspects, who fled in a 1987 Oldsmobile Cutlass, police said.

The victims got the auto`s tag number and called police. Pfeiffer saw the suspects` car heading south on Southwest Seventh Avenue, but the suspects also saw him and jumped out of the car after parking behind a Hess gas station on Broward Boulevard, police said.

The teen-ager ran to an Amoco station across the street and forced a woman passenger out of a Chevrolet Monte Carlo in front of the gas pumps. He sped away with police in pursuit until the crash under the bridge, police said.

His accomplice got away and was still being sought Friday night. The car that the suspects abandoned not only contained the purse taken in the strong-arm robbery, but another purse taken earlier Friday in a car burglary at the Galleria mall, police said.

Police filed charges of strong-arm robbery and attempted strong-arm robbery against the teen-ager who was arrested.